The Undecided Title Of Sara Miller *Hobbit Fanfiction* (Thorin/OC)

Chapter 33: Aftermath

Alright, sorry for the wait on your end but we had to take one of the twins to the hospital and that threw me off... but he is doing good now and should be well in a few days. On top of that this is another enormous chapter. I suppose I could split it up... but figure it dose not really matter. So here you are. It's mostly dialog... but hopefully you enjoy it... its some hefty stuff.

In which there is much discussion.

Plonk... Plonk... The sound of rocks falling into the stream was interspersed with the sets of footsteps approaching from behind. Sara didn't have to look, she had a pretty good idea who was approaching by the occasional thud of a staff on the ground. It wasn't as though she had exactly hid her trail. At first Sara had just run, run away from the barn, from Thorin, from everything. If only she could have run away from Middle Earth all together, or from the Valar and the knowledge she now was forced to carry. She had been called back to herself when her feet had splashed into the water of the small stream, her boots filling with water. She had run to the forest that closed around Beorn's land on all sides but the west. She wiggled her slimy toes, wringing her nose at the feel of her wet socks. She had easily outpaced the old dog that followed her, but he had the better nose and after a while he had come limping back to her side. Tom raised his head from where he lay several feet away, peering into the foliage behind them as the others came closer. The decaying log beneath her was covered with a thick moss that grew between the deep grooves of bark, and she shifted uncomfortably as she reached for more stones to cast into the burbling stream. Dappled light seeped through the tall pines and reflected off its ever changing surface. Sara liked the water, always had. There was something about the way it moved, the way that life emanated from it, that always worked to calm her. Today, however, it had done little to ease her shifting moods of anger, grief, confusion, and exhaustion. Apparently her current circumstances were not to be washed away like the dust of the road, but to be carried and endured like the scars on her arms. Two sets of heavy dwarvish boots came into the periphery of her vision to the left and a long gray robe to the right. How could she tell them... tell them that their king, that Thorin and the line of Durin would die. In vain she wished that Nori had never stolen her phone and let himself in on her secret.

"Well, have you finished it now?" asked Nori, coming to stand in front of her. She nodded and Gandalf took a seat next to her.

"And?" pressed the thief.

"And what?" she stalled, searching for a way out of this conversation. What she really wanted to do was talk to Gandalf alone, but she knew Nori would never allow it and it would only make it harder to keep things from him. Gandalf, she thought, was not about to go off half-cocked and tell the company everything, as Nori would be likely to do. She was not yet sure if she should tell Thorin, Fili, and Kili about their fates, but if they were to know, she wanted it to come from her and no other. They deserve that much at least.

"I believe Master Nori, a more prudent way to approach the subject would be to ask specific questions," suggested the wizard, withdrawing his pipe from his robes. Nori huffed, irritated and impatient.

"Very well. Do we succeed in taking back the mountain?" he asked. A vague idea began to form in Sara's mind of how to get rid of the dwarves without revealing too much of her hand.

"Yes," she said, dropping a white stone into the water. "The mountain is reclaimed by the company."

"What of the rumors of Smaug? Are they right? Is he still in the mountain? Is he alive?"

"Yes," she said. Another splash, another white stone. "He is there and very much alive." Bifur said something to Nori.

"Do we find the Arkenstone? Do the other clans come to our aid and help to drive out the worm," translated Nori.